DUNCAN WOOD is the director of the Mexico Institute at the Wilson Center. Prior to this, he was a professor and the director of the International Relations Program at the Instituto Tecnologico Autonomo de Mexico (ITAM) in Mexico City for 17 years. He has been a member of the Mexican National Research System, an editorial advisor to both Reforma and El Universal newspapers, and is a member of the editorial board of Foreign Affairs Latinoamerica. In 2007, he was a non-resident Fulbright Fellow and, between 2007 and 2009, he was technical secretary of the Red Mexicana de Energia, a group of experts in the area of energy policy in Mexico. He has been a Senior Associate with the Simon Chair and the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, D.C. His research focuses on Mexican energy policy, including renewable energy, and North American relations. He studied in the UK and Canada, receiving his PhD in political studies from Queen’s University, Canada, and is a recipient of the Canadian Governor General’s Visit Award for contributions to the Mexico-Canada relationship.

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The Woodrow Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute and Latin American Program and the Institute for Studies and Communication on Migration (Instituto de Estudios y Divulgación sobre Migración, INEDIM) were pleased to host a presentation of the following study: Quo Vadis? Recruitment and Contracting of Migrant Workers and their Access to Social Security: The Dynamics of Temporary Labor Migration Systems in North and Central America. more

“Approving the treaty will create new levels of legal certainty for US and Mexican firms operating in Gulf of Mexico border regions, encouraging them to engage in the risk-taking required to produce oil from deep water,” said Duncan Wood, director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. more

On March 14, 2013, Duncan Wood, Director of the Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute, testified before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs’ Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere. The hearing, titled “U.S. Energy Security: Enhancing Partnerships with Mexico and Canada,” included a discussion of the Keystone XL pipeline and the Transboundary Hydrocarbons Agreement. more

“After 12 years of gridlock, you now have a way of negotiating between the parties that enables legislative progress,” says Duncan Wood, director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center in Washington. “It has become the central negotiating mechanism for Mexican politics today.” more

"This goes way beyond education. It's about sending a signal to other unions in particular that they need to come on board to the government's program," Wood said. "As it has played out, I think it has been a stroke of genius." more

“They are talking seriously about allowing private investment in the oil sector in general, [but] they want the state to retain control. So what that actually means in reality is very tough to work out,” he said. “Because retaining control could be legislative, regulatory; it could be the dominant player. No one is quite sure what that means.” more

Last Saturday’s vote by the PRI party to change its statutes to allow for the application of the value added tax (IVA) to food and medicine, and to allow for increased private participation in the oil sector, significantly improves the prospects for the reform process under Enrique Peña Nieto. This marks an important victory for the reformers within the party, and is a sign that the government now faces minimal internal party divisions that could hold back the reform process. more

The so-called “Pact for Mexico,” along with the PRI’s likely passage of rule changes this weekend, give Pena Nieto the momentum needed to push for sweeping reforms, said Duncan Wood of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. more

Duncan Wood, director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, said that while a great deal of attention has focused on the arrest’s likely impact on education in Mexico, it is only one part of a larger story about the exercise of power. “It’s not just about education,” he said. “It’s about so much more than that.” more

“The PRD cannot sign on for an ambitious energy reform, and they’ve been quite explicit about that,” Duncan Wood, director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, said in an interview.

“Approving the treaty will create new levels of legal certainty for US and Mexican firms operating in Gulf of Mexico border regions, encouraging them to engage in the risk-taking required to produce oil from deep water,” said Duncan Wood, director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

“After 12 years of gridlock, you now have a way of negotiating between the parties that enables legislative progress,” says Duncan Wood, director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center in Washington. “It has become the central negotiating mechanism for Mexican politics today.”

"This goes way beyond education. It's about sending a signal to other unions in particular that they need to come on board to the government's program," Wood said. "As it has played out, I think it has been a stroke of genius."

“They are talking seriously about allowing private investment in the oil sector in general, [but] they want the state to retain control. So what that actually means in reality is very tough to work out,” he said. “Because retaining control could be legislative, regulatory; it could be the dominant player. No one is quite sure what that means.”

Last Saturday’s vote by the PRI party to change its statutes to allow for the application of the value added tax (IVA) to food and medicine, and to allow for increased private participation in the oil sector, significantly improves the prospects for the reform process under Enrique Peña Nieto. This marks an important victory for the reformers within the party, and is a sign that the government now faces minimal internal party divisions that could hold back the reform process.

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The Woodrow Wilson Center's Mexico Institute hosted the launch of the report "The U.S.-Mexico Border Economy in Transition." This report is drawn from a series of four U.S.-Mexico Regional Economic Competitiveness Forums in order to engage border region stakeholders in a process to collectively generate a shared vision and policy recommendations to strengthen economic competitiveness.

The Mexico Institute hosted a book launch and discussion of the rule of law in Mexico. Wilson Center Global Fellow Luis Rubio presented his book "A Mexican Utopia: The Rule of Law is Possible." After his presentation, several leading analysts discussed the development of the rule of law in Mexico, noting challenges and offering policy prescriptions.

The Wilson Center's Mexico Institute hosted its Second Annual Mexican Security Review, The State of Citizen Security in Mexico: 2014 in Review and the Year Ahead. The forum provided a careful examination of security challenges in Mexico, featuring presentations from leading policy analysts. Of particular interest were the available indicators of crime trends, analysis of the specific policy measures of the Peña Nieto administration, and the efforts of civil society to confront recent security problems in Mexico.

The disappearance of 43 students after clashes with police in Iguala, Mexico has left Mexicans horrified and outraged, and has led to nationwide protests. Join us by phone for a discussion of these events, the response by the government and by society, and the impact on Mexico’s international image with two experts on the ground.

The Woodrow Wilson Center's Mexico Institute and the Be Foundation were pleased to host the First Binational Forum on Migration and the Right to an Identity: The Double Invisibility of Mexican Migrants in light of Potential U.S. Immigration Reform.

The Mexican energy industry is set for transformation after President Enrique Peña Nieto signed into law the reform's secondary legislation in August. On Friday, November 14, 2014, the Woodrow Wilson Center's Mexico Institute and the Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center hosted an event at the Wilson Center featuring the first major policy address in the United States by two of the top Mexican officials leading this reform.

The Wilson Center's Mexico Institute, in collaboration with The Institute of Economics and Peace, was pleased to host a discussion on the challenges and opportunities for building a more peaceful society in Mexico.

The Woodrow Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute, in collaboration with Freedom House, hosted a discussion of the impact of the Telecom Reform. A panel of leading thinkers discussed the telecommunications reform and its implications for freedom of expression, as well as the ongoing debate about the reform’s secondary legislation.

The Mexico Institute and the Inter-American Dialogue cordially invite you to a discussion of the prospects for the secondary legislation and the key elements that should be included in the process for implementing the reforms. A panel of leading energy experts will address the challenges and opportunities for the forthcoming debate in the Mexican congress.

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Mexico's security strategy is evolving with a focus on coordination and violence reduction. Although tensions have emerged in the short term, the long term offers a number of prospects for fruitful collaboration between the United States and Mexico in the security arena.

On March 14, 2013, Duncan Wood, Director of the Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute, testified before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs’ Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere. The hearing, titled “U.S. Energy Security: Enhancing Partnerships with Mexico and Canada,” included a discussion of the Keystone XL pipeline and the Transboundary Hydrocarbons Agreement.

Based on the collaborative work of a high‐level group of Mexican energy experts during the first half of 2012, this report focuses on the issues facing Mexico’s hydrocarbon sector and the most important principles that must underlie the forthcoming reform of the country’s oil and gas industry. Although multiple diagnoses of the sector exist, in recent years there has been no fundamental examination of the principles that should underlie the nation’s energy policy.

The U.S.-Mexico border region is one of enormous energy resources, both traditional and renewable. This report provides an overview of the prospects for renewable energy projects in Mexico’s border states, examining the development of wind, solar and municipal solid waste projects. This research evaluates the potential impact of investment in these projects on border communities in terms of employment, infrastructure, human capital and social participation.

With over 1,000 MW of wind energy capacity now installed and another 2,000 MW under construction, Mexico’s wind energy sector has grown dramatically since the early 1990s. This report examines the potential for creating economic benefits in border states from wind energy development, with particular attention paid to employment and infrastructure.

This report recognizes the growing potential for bioenergy, which has attracted public and private sector interest in recent years. It has become clear that Mexico’s land and labor costs make the cross-border trade in renewable energy an exciting and potentially highly profitable sector. Of bioenergy feedstocks, municipal solid waste may represent the greatest potential for growth in Mexico and the U.S.-Mexico transborder region.

First in his series of Monthly Reports on PEMEX and U.S.-Mexico Energy Cooperation, this article explores the implications of the recently signed Transboundary Hydrocarbons Agreement, which resolves the question of what to do with potential oil reserves along the dividing line between Mexico and the United States in the Gulf of Mexico. Wood sees the agreement as "extremely good news," as it marks the "end of a decades-long process to try to determine oil rights in these two areas, opening the door to exploration and production that offers the prospect of exciting new modes of cooperation between Pemex and private oil companies."